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The CTO Playbook

The CTO Playbook

Written by: Adam Horner
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 Join Adam Horner, a CTO with over 30 years in the tech industry, on The CTO Playbook — the podcast dedicated to helping CTOs excel. Perfect for CTOs and tech leaders navigating the complexities of their roles, each episode offers clear insights, innovative strategies, and practical advice from top leaders in tech. With Adam’s extensive experience mentoring engineers and tech leaders, and over a decade as a CTO, you’ll gain the tools and knowledge to build and refine your own CTO playbook. Whether you're tackling complex projects, fostering innovation, leading teams, or shaping your company's tech strategy, this podcast is your go-to resource. Adam’s journey from engineer to strategic CTO was challenging. He learned through the school of hard knocks, making avoidable mistakes and facing countless challenges. Often out of his comfort zone and wishing for more guidance, he created this podcast to provide the support and advice he once lacked. Tune in for engaging interviews, leadership tips, and the latest in technology strategy. Each episode is designed to help you lead with confidence and level up as a CTO. Listen now to start your journey with The CTO Playbook and build your own playbook to excel in your role.Copyright 2024-2026 Economics Management Management & Leadership Self-Help Success
Episodes
  • 92: The CTO Playbook: How to Build Trust, Consistency, and Psychological Safety in Engineering Teams

    92: The CTO Playbook: How to Build Trust, Consistency, and Psychological Safety in Engineering Teams
    Apr 20 2026
    The difference between a good CTO and a trusted one often comes down to a personal playbook.Build your own CTO Playbook at www.theCTOplaybook.com — the leadership platform built for the full CTO journey. Coaching, podcast, and community to help you lead with clarity, confidence, and strategic impact.Sam Boswell is the CTO of Terralayr, an energy tech company focused on solving global energy storage challenges. With a background in high-risk infrastructure and scaling engineering teams, he brings a practical lens to how leadership actually works.At the center of that philosophy is a simple idea. Engineers don’t follow leaders because they’re the most technically brilliant person in the room. They follow leaders who are consistent.That consistency doesn’t happen by accident. It comes from a personal playbook. A set of lived principles that shape how decisions are made, how problems are approached, and how people are treated.We get into how that playbook forms over time, why documenting how you think matters more than most leaders realize, and what happens inside teams when that consistency is missing.The result is a grounded look at leadership that moves beyond theory. It shows what it takes to build trust, create safety, and lead in a way people actually want to follow.You’ll Learn:[00:00] Introduction[05:12] The shift from coding to leading people[07:45] Turning ideas into outcomes without touching the code[12:18] Why consistency earns trust faster than brilliance[15:42] Writing as a tool for clearer thinking and better leadership[18:36] What breaks inside teams when leadership is inconsistent[22:04] The power of a personal user manual for faster trust[26:31] There’s always a move, even when you feel stuck[30:12] Small principles that compound into better decisions[36:48] Psychological safety as the foundation of real performanceResources Mentioned:OODA Loop | WikipediaThe Joel Test: 12 Steps to Better Code | WebsiteNotion | WebsiteKnolling | WebsiteTom Sachs’ 10 Bullets | WebsiteTime Enough for Love by Robert Heinlein | Book or AudiobookJoyful Militancy: Building Thriving Resistance in Toxic Times by Carla Bergman and Nick Montgomery | Book or AudiobookEve Online | Video GameKanban Tool | WebsiteFind more from Sam on LinkedIn.Find more from Adam on LinkedIn and YouTube, and explore coaching, cohorts, and how you can stay up to date at theCTOplaybook.com, helping you build your own playbook for your path at your pace.
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    44 mins
  • 91: The Hardest Upgrade for Technical Leaders: Leading Without Losing Your Edge

    91: The Hardest Upgrade for Technical Leaders: Leading Without Losing Your Edge
    Apr 13 2026
    What if leadership isn’t about managing people, but about owning decisions?Build your own CTO Playbook at www.theCTOplaybook.com — the leadership platform built for the full CTO journey. Coaching, podcast, and community to help you lead with clarity, confidence, and strategic impact.I’m joined by Michael Di Prisco, who describes himself as “a software engineer struggling to realize that he became a tech leader”.Michael was pretty reluctant to become an engineering manager and leave the keyboard, but he started moving outside his comfort zone one step at a time. He gradually found a balance where he still writes code, but it is not expected of him.We explore how authority and responsibility actually work inside a team. He explains why every engineer should understand the business, and what changed when he started delegating code instead of doing everything himself. That shift did not slow the team down. The quality of their coding was becoming better, and people could focus on what they wanted to do more.We also get into documenting technical debt and how his team reached a point where they solved more debt than they created.If you are thinking about the move into leadership, this is a grounded look at what that shift might actually involve.You’ll Learn:[00:00] Introduction[02:05] Stepping into leadership felt like losing his edge as an engineer[06:45] A small move outside your comfort zone can shift your entire career path[08:30] Coding stopped being expected and started becoming a deliberate choice[12:10] Teams can improve when a tech lead stops doing all the coding and starts delegating[16:20] The hidden gap between responsibility and authority most teams never fix[20:15] Engineers make weaker decisions when they don’t understand the business[24:40] Letting go of best practices can reveal what actually works in your context[27:10] Documenting technical debt can lead to actually reducing it over time[31:25] Small steps and honest feedback often outperform big career movesResources Mentioned:The Software Architect Elevator: Redefining the Architect's Role in the Digital Enterprise by Gregor Hohpe | BookArchitectural Decision Records (ADR) | WebsiteGitHub | WebsiteAstro | WebsiteCodeMotion Conference | Websitejsday - The Italian JavaScript Conference | WebsiteItalian Agile Days Conference | WebsiteDive deeper into Michael’s ideas on software engineering and leadership on his blog.Find more from Michael on LinkedIn.Find more from Adam on LinkedIn and YouTube, and explore coaching, cohorts, and how you can stay up to date at theCTOplaybook.com, helping you build your own playbook for your path at your pace.
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    39 mins
  • 90: Data Is a Leadership Problem, Not a Technical One — A Playbook for CTOs

    90: Data Is a Leadership Problem, Not a Technical One — A Playbook for CTOs
    Apr 6 2026
    Most teams don’t have a data problem; they have a decision problem.Build your own CTO Playbook at www.theCTOplaybook.com — the leadership platform built for the full CTO journey. Coaching, podcast, and community to help you lead with clarity, confidence, and strategic impact.Nic Granger, Chief Information and Financial Officer at the North Sea Transition Authority, joins me to share her perspective from the intersection of data, finance, and transformation in a highly complex, regulated industry.Nic leads a multidisciplinary portfolio spanning digital, data, and core services, with a focus on enabling better decisions across the energy transition.We get into why data strategy is fundamentally a human challenge, not just a technical one, and how data-driven decision making only works when people can actually access and trust the data. You’ll hear how data leadership shifts when the goal isn’t dashboards, but real-world outcomes like energy security and decarbonization.We also unpack why jumping straight to AI in business often misses the point, and what it really takes to build strong data foundations that support scale. If you’re responsible for digital transformation or shaping CTO strategy, this will likely reframe how you think about value, not just volume.You’ll Learn:[00:00] Introduction[03:15] The value of data has nothing to do with the data itself, and what it actually comes down to[07:30] Nic's realization that turning petabytes into value is a people problem, not a technology problem[10:05] The mistake most organizations make with data is jumping to AI before they've solved anything[13:00] What decades of vital data trapped in unreadable PDFs look like, and what AI is doing about it[16:45] Making industry data freely available unlocked competition from smaller players and academia in ways nobody expected[21:20] Your team is probably already asking the right data questions; you just have to listen for them[27:45] The reason Nic's team swapped the word "process" for "workflow" and what the language shift actually changed[31:20] Digitizing a paper trolley process revealed hidden data that now predicts industry trends[37:00] The one thing Nic says every CTO should prioritize in the next 90 days to unlock data valueIf you want to support the work Nic mentioned, become a member of the Bat Conservation Trust. Resources Mentioned:CTO Craft | WebsiteUK National Data Repository (NDR) | WebsiteBat Conservation Trust | WebsiteFalklands Conservation | WebsiteLovable AI | WebsiteBase44 | WebsiteIf you want to support the work Nic mentioned, become a member of the Bat Conservation Trust. Find more from Nic Granger on LinkedIn.Find more from Adam on LinkedIn and YouTube, and explore coaching, cohorts, and how you can stay up to date at theCTOplaybook.com, helping you build your own playbook for your path at your pace.
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    38 mins
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